Melissa McCarthy is taking on one of the most challenging dramatic roles of her career, portraying Patsy Ramsey, the mother of murdered pageant contestant JonBenét Ramsey.
The 56-year-old actress has shared her personal view of the six-year-old’s tragic death ahead of Netflix’s upcoming series about the still-unsolved case.
“Just my personal feeling. My heart says no one in the family could have done that,” McCarthy told Variety this week.
“I don’t have the ability, or probably the right, to say that, but that’s what my gut says. Which I probably am not supposed to say,” she added.
“But shooting [the series], I had to pick. I had to have that for myself, if nothing else.”
JonBenét was found beaten and bound in the basement of her family’s Colorado home in 1996.
Melissa McCarthy believes that no one in JonBenét Ramsey’s family could have killed the pageant contestant
The 56-year-old actress will portray Patsy Ramsey in Netflix’s The Murder of JonBenét Ramsey
No one has ever been successfully charged or prosecuted for the murder, despite decades of public debate and numerous theories surrounding the case.
McCarthy said she has “now read every police report, every coroner’s report” connected to the investigation. However, she emphasized that the Netflix production is a “character study,” rather than a “whodunnit.”
“This might sound nuts: I’m very fond of Patsy,” she said.
“I have so much compassion for them, what they went through, and go through currently.”
McCarthy stars alongside Clive Owen, who plays John Ramsey, in Netflix’s The Murder of JonBenét Ramsey. The series was produced without the family’s involvement.
Patsy died from ovarian cancer in 2006. John married Jan Rousseaux in 2011, and the couple now live in Michigan.
The series is being led by showrunner Richard LaGravenese, whose credits include writing the Liberace biopic Behind the Candelabra and The Bridges of Madison County, starring Kevin Costner.
In June, John Ramsey told Fox News Digital that he was seeking new DNA testing after former Colorado Bureau of Investigation forensic analyst Yvonne “Missy” Woods pleaded guilty to several charges.
JonBenét was discovered beaten and bound in the basement of her family’s Colorado home in 1996
McCarthy said she is “very fond” of the late Patsy Ramsey and has “read every police report, every coroner’s report” connected to JonBenét’s case
Woods pleaded guilty on June 23 to cybercrime, first-degree perjury, attempting to influence a public servant and forgery stemming from criminal conduct.
Ramsey acknowledged that Woods’s misconduct did not affect the evidence in his daughter’s case, but he is calling for the testing to be carried out at an independent facility.
This year marks the 30th anniversary of the six-year-old’s brutal murder in Boulder, when the Ramseys awoke the day after Christmas to find a ransom note and their daughter missing.
Her tiny mutilated body was found hours later in the basement of the family home; she had suffered blunt force trauma and been strangled with a garrote, a knotted rope weapon tied to a piece of wood.
CBS was sued for defamation by JonBenet’s brother Burke Ramsey for $750 million in 2016.
He took legal action after CBS broadcast a documentary that included false claims that he may have murdered his sister.
Burke was only nine at the time and has never been charged. The suit was settled for an undisclosed amount.
In the CBS show, panelists theorized that Burke hit his sister over the head with a heavy object during a sibling argument, before it was covered up by his parents.
The suggestions were not based on evidence and were not supported by investigators, and the documentary resulted in CBS settling Burke’s lawsuit three years later for an undisclosed sum.
